Obama series 3/3: User Generated content and Community

In the final part of the three-part series on Obama we’re looking at User Generated Content and Online communities. 

Community

Obama used, very effectively, 16 social networking sites – ranging from ‘Facebook’, ‘MySpace’ and ‘Twitter’ to ‘AsianAve’, ‘Faithbase’ and ‘Eons’ – to build a community of supporters aggregated in one place to whom he could blog (well, someone on his behalf we imagine), and importantly with whom he created a two-way dialogue (as opposed to a web-based corporate bill-board of promises summed up in values, behaviours and future projects).  Our generation probably learned more about Obama from social media than we did from his website, or any written document. Log on to any of these and we can rate him, tweet and retweet him, vlog in response to his vlog or offer an opinion.  In so-doing we felt listened to. Furthermore Obama espoused the generation y motto ‘ask, don’t tell’.  It’s genius.  Generation Y wants a ‘conversation’, not just a static page of content and a load of promises.  In these communities we can find out more about him whenever we want. He appears ‘transparent’.

Obama won this race with our generation because: his story had ‘viral’ quality (and we passed it round); He gave Generation Y a vision (and asked for their support to achieve it).  He gave us ownership for achieving it (and used social media incredibly well to create a dialogue) with this voter demographic. Oh, and did we mention that behind every successful president is a 27 year old speech writer?         

Make ‘Flickr’/ MySpace/ Facebook your office!

A recent article in the Financial Times (‘Social Networking sites elevate geeks to online gurus[1]’) illustrated how three young forward thinking and entrepreneurial individuals started making cash by having something as simple as a ‘Flickr’ [sic.] page! “Cant’ have been making much” I hear the pessimist say. Well an extra £9,000 p.a. worked okay for Kevin Meredith (a.k.a ‘Lomokev’). In February 2009 he will also release his first book (‘Hot Shots’) and it’s already on pre-order in Amazon! His clients now include shoe manufacturer Dr Martens.
Let’s try another example: Paul Griffiths (21) sold £500,000 worth of tee-shirts, hooded tops and badges from humble beginnings 24 months ago through a MySpace profile see: Babycakes Clothing (the profile has sound effects when we last checked, try http://www.bbycks.com/ if you’d rather see the site without sound!) and now he has a shop in Manchester, and employs 10 people! From what we can see though, this isn’t just a tee-shirt printing business, it’s a kind of ‘following’. There’s a blog; buyers can upload their photos of them wearing the clothing and they have BabyCakes parties... OK, so it’s not everybody’s ‘cup of tea’ but... for 21 it’s no bad effort.
So what can we learn? First, Naked Generations will be the first to say that we predict a trend: As the cost of higher education increases and the uncertainty of what were ‘permanent jobs’ continues, we predict that a noticeable portion of Generation Y (and Generation Z beneath them) will not enter traditional jobs or training programmes like the generations before them. Instead they will capitalise on the mediums of sites such as facebook, flickr, Ebay, and YouTube to sell home-grown ideas to the masses.
And if you’re still thinking (to quote Boris Johnson) “that’s a load of boulder-dash” and, it will never cross over into the real world listen to this:
Ms Lauren Luke (27) launched a series of video tutorials through YouTube about applying make-up to copy the styles of the likes of Kylie Minogue, Britney Spears and Leona Lewis. They were watched, the styles were copied, she received a whole lot of attention and now writes a column in the (UK’s) Guardian Newspaper weekend magazine. Oh, and just before Christmas she flew to New York to begin designing a make-up range for Barry M. Our guess is the Guardian is attracting the next generation of readers by using the leverage that Ms Luke has created for herself online.

[1] Bradshaw, T., http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/68d9ef4c-d86f-11dd-bcc0-000077b07658.html Financial Times, 2 January 2009 (p.10)

Online Partnerships

Networking, socialising, interacting, selling and learning: it has all changed.


Companies that are realising this include Mercedes Benz who signed a media broadcasting deal with the online networking site A Small World (ASW) – their mission: ‘to aggregate the world’s most interesting people with the world’s most interesting information’ (as explained by CEO Joe Robinson). Olaf Göttgens (VP Brand Communications) from Mercedes Benz Cars explains how along with their competitors Audi and BMW they have launched Mercedes Benz TV in order to keep up with online representation. So, is TV, Radio, Magazine, dare I say it ‚face-to-face communication obsolete for the next generation? Emphatically no. Nonetheless, they communicate in many more ways than the Baby Boomers, even the Xers do. Online is a trend, more than a fad - and it is an important and strategic new opportunity to distribute (see BMW/ASW press release here).
Generation Y grew up with technology. They were encouraged to use it. You could drive from London to Paris in a time of 4 hours 46 minutes (according to ViaMichelin.com, and assuming you have a car already it would cost you about 60 Euros to fund the petrol). Instead you could fly in 1 hour 20 minutes with a low-cost airline for less money (alternatively you could meet up online).
The mentality for this generation is: ‘It’s here so let’s use it’. To have over 300 friends on Facebook is quite normal. (Do i need to have met all of them face-to-face? No. and where i haven't they are gateway's into other communities, pockets of information or invitations to events). Imagine being able to harness those networks through your employees for the reputation of your company. Its sheer innovative capability. The distribution opportunities. What will be the value of individuals in the 16-30 age bracket as influencers, or consumers in your industry over the next 3 years?

With so many people vying for their attention, what will you do to secure your distribution channels of the future?

What are they saying about your brand online?


Change Matters.


Charles Darwin had this sewn up, somewhat prophetically and ahead of his time when he said: ‘It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change’ (Charles Darwin, 1809-1882).